The drama hidden mass rape during the fall of Berlin

The statue of a soldier of the Soviet Red Army commemorating dead in the capture of Berlin at the end of World War II.

The performance of the troops of
the Soviet Union in the defeat of Nazi Germany during the Second World
War is one of the most glorious moments of this nation.

However, 70 years later, a review of these last days of the war
reveals a dark corner of this story. mass rape of German women by Soviet
soldiers

Second hand testimonies, it is a warning Some readers may find disturbing.

Price Berlin

outside Berlin Treptow Park, there is a statue of about 12 meters
high, with the figure of a Soviet soldier with a sword in his hand and a
German girl in the other, stepping on a broken swastika

In pictures:. The celebration of Victory Day

Thus symbolize the place where 5,000 deaths 80,000 Red Army soldiers died in Berlin between April 16 and May 2, 1945.

The proportion colossal monument reflects the magnitude of the
sacrifice. Inevitably registration has observed the statue that reads
what the Soviet people saved European civilization from fascism.

Ukrainian Vladimir Gelfand kept a diary of his experience in 1941.

Gelfand rode a bike for the first time in Berlin.

However, for many, this memorial is called Tomb of the Unknown rapist.

There are records many cases of violations committed by the troops
of the Red Army in Berlin, even though it was not discussed in the years
following the end of the war, especially taboo Russia today.

Russian media often refer to as mass rape of western myths, although
many found data were extracted from the diary of a young Soviet
soldier.

The newspaper recounts the horror

Vladimir Gelfand was a young Jewish lieutenant, the central region
of Ukraine, who wrote with brutal opening all the details of the
atrocities of war since 1941. Although the army was forbidden to wear
every day, given a security risk.

The manuscript was widely published and paint the chaos of life in
his battalion, characterized by poor food rations, lice, antisemitism
and theft (who flew to peer Boots) .

In February 1945, Gelfand was parked near the dam of the river Oder,
where the army was preparing for the final blow on Berlin. Which tells
how his comrades surrounded and annihilated battalions of German women
fighters.

“German cats we caught saying they were avenging their dead
husbands,” wrote Lieutenant. “We must destroy them without mercy. Our
soldiers suggest stab his genitals, but only run it. “

The newspapers were banned because they are considered a threat to security.

One of the most revealing passages, he wrote on April 25, when they
had come to Berlin. Gelfand realized he was lying on a bicycle on the
river Spree, when he ran into a German group that carried suitcases and
packages.

With a poor German asked where they were going and why they had left their homes.

“With horror on their faces, they told me that they had spent the
first night of our arrival of the Red Army to the city,” he writes.

“I nailed’m here, “said one of the girls and lifted her skirt.” All
night. They were old and others had pimples. Changes mounted. No less
than 20 men, “before bursting into tears.

Lieutenant that girl suddenly vomited and he said,” You can sleep with me what you want with me, but only you. “

By that time the violations and abuses committed by German soldiers
in the Soviet Union have been widely known for. the last four years,
which Gelfand had learned first hand while opening stage to Germany.

The first attack

Germans

Gelfand son, Vitaly, his father saw the Nazi troops destroyed
whole villages, even killing small children. He also saw evidence of
massive violations.

The German army was supposedly a well-organized composed of Aryans
force they could not have sex with what they considered sub-human.

Gelfand found the diary after his father died.

However, according to the historian of the School of Advanced
Studies in Economics in Moscow, Oleg Budnitsky, this ban has been openly
ignored.

Indeed, the Nazi leaders were so concerned about cases of venereal
diseases that have established a chain of military brothels in the
occupied territories.

It is difficult to see how they were treated in Russia by German
soldiers, since most do not survive German occupation but the Russian
Museum in Berlin, headed by Jorg Morre, shows a photograph the corpse of
a woman lying on the floor in Crimea taken by a German soldier.

“It looks as if it had been killed at or after being
raped. Her skirt is raised and his hands on his face,” said Morre.

The time of revenge

When the Red Army began its march toward Germany, call the Soviet
press as “the lair of the beast”, published posters encouraging soldiers
to show their anger: “Soldier: Now you are on German soil. It is time
to take revenge. “

Soviet soldiers distributed food among Berliners.

Historian Antony Beevor that while conducting research to develop
the book “The Fall” in 2002, sexual violence of documents found in the
archives of the Russian Federation. They had been gathered by the secret
police and sent to his boss, Beria, at the end of 1944.

“They were presented to Stalin. There are reports of mass rapes
committed in East Prussia, and how German preferred to kill their
daughters and themselves to avoid that fate, “said Beevor.

adapt to survive

Another source of information is the girlfriend of a German soldier
newspaper which reads that women adapted to the severe circumstances for
survival.

from April 20, 1945, ten days before Hitler committed suicide, the
anonymous author describes the scenes of its neighbors during bombing
Berlin.

Berliners had trouble with the soldiers who liberated them from the Nazis.

She noted that people ran away who was in your building and mentions
a “young gray pants and sunglasses, which proved a little closer to
being a woman.”

also describes three elderly sisters who stayed embraced all the
time and they used to joke: “. Better a Russky (Russian) above which a
Yank (Yankee) in the head “In other words, it was preferable to spray
rape by American bombing.

When the Soviets arrived, the women asked the columnist to use his
knowledge of Russian to talk to the officer in charge, so she left the
shelter and spoke to him, but he just shrugged. “He spent what was occur
anyway, “he wrote then.

The soldiers took the neighbors have been locked away for brutally
raped and nearly strangled. When the neighbors came, they found their
stockings fall shoes. In his hand, he was always one of the straps of
her bra

She started screaming. “Pigs, let me raped twice in a row and left me lying there like garbage!” Bed everyday.

Berlin was devastated by Allied bombing.

Then he realized that to remain immune to the massive violations had
to find a “wolf” to protect it. He started a less violent and more
transactional relationship with Leningrad official.

“Not at all, I can say that rape me. What am I doing to snuff,
sugar, butter, candles and canned meat? To some extent, I am safe. In
addition, less he wants from me, the more I like as a person, “he wrote.

The newspaper was published in 1959 under the title “A Woman in
Berlin” but generated strong protests from the public on the reasons the
book damaged the reputation of German women.

New allegations 70 years later

The 70th anniversary of the end of the war brought new
investigations and allegations of sexual abuse by US soldiers Allies,
British, French and Soviet who began to emerge.

However, the liberating feeling for women materialized in 2008 with
the premiere of Anonymous, an adaptation of the book “A Woman in
Berlin”, causing a cathartic effect for many victims who had been silent
until then .

Ingeborg concerned who took refuge in the basement of his building when the Soviets arrived.

The woman thought she was dying.

There is Bullert Ingeborg, now 90 years old. The woman said that
when the Soviets came to his district of Berlin, were tanks in the
street. As we all took shelter in the basement of his building.

One of the nights of bombing, left the shelter and went to find his
apartment a piece of rope to hang a lamp. Suddenly struck by two Soviet
soldiers who subjected him by arms.

“I raped her. I thought they would kill me,” he recalls. Ingeborg
never told his bitter experience, it seemed very difficult to tell
someone. “My mother liked to boast that her daughter had not exchanged”
he said.

Never will the number of victims

only between June 1945-1946, there were 995 abortions in requests
one of Berlin. The files were written by hand with the children to write
reports denouncing abuses in the house of life in front of their
parents.

The Soviets claimed their flag in the German parliament.

But probably never a final assessment is known. Sources of information remain classified military courts.

Russian Congress passed a law that anyone who denigrates the actions
of Russia during the Second World War will face fines and up to five
years in prison.

Vitaly Gelfand, Vladimir memoirist son does not deny that many
Soviet soldiers showed courage and sacrifice during the war, but that is
not the whole story.

“If people do not want the truth, did it wrong. The world
understands it, includes Russia and the people who make these laws to
defame the past also understand. We can not go forward until you look
back, “said Vitaly.